Elon Musk declares Grok to be ‘on the side of angels’ amid X undressing scandal

Elon Musk has said his X platform’s AI bot, Grok, is “on the side of the angels,” amid controversy over the AI being used to make sexualised fake images, including explicit non-consensual depictions of women and children with their clothes removed.

As outrage has grown over the thousands of images users have asked the chatbot to generate, many prominent people, politicians, and children, in states of undress or with wet clothes, have repeatedly championed Grok on X.

Retweeting a post which claims that other AI bots are “super racist” towards white people, Musk wrote: “Grok is on the side of the angels.”

The post comes hours after xAI announced it has raised $20bn in its latest funding round, with some of the companies participating in the round including Nvidia, Fidelity Management and Research Company, Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund, and Valor Equity Partners.

However, global concern has mounted following xAI’s recent rollout of an "edit image" button on Grok, which allowed users to edit existing images through prompts such as "put her in a bikini" or "remove her clothes.”

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Earlier this week, Ashley St. Clair, a conservative influencer and alleged mother to one of Musk’s children, claimed Grok had been used to generate photos of her undressing as a child, based on a real photograph taken when she was 14.

“Grok is now undressing photos of me as a child. This is a website where the owner says to post photos of your children. I really don’t care if people want to call me ‘scorned’; this is objectively horrifying, illegal, and if it has happened to anybody else, DM me. I got time,” she wrote in an X post.

Images of Catherine, Princess of Wales, were also among those digitally stripped by Grok users on X.

Amid a barrage of posts promoting Grok, Musk has also warned that anyone using Grok to generate illegal content would “suffer the same consequences” as if they uploaded it themselves.

Earlier this week, a spokesperson for X said: “We take action against illegal content on X, including child sexual abuse material, by removing it, permanently suspending accounts and working with local governments and law enforcement as necessary.”

In Europe, the European Commission – the EU’s de facto digital watchdog – said this week it was “very seriously” examining the complaints about Grok.

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"Grok is now offering a 'spicy mode' showing explicit sexual content with some output generated with childlike images. This is not spicy. This is illegal. This is appalling," EU digital affairs spokesman Thomas Regnier said.

"This has no place in Europe."

St. Clair’s complaint isn’t the first time Grok has been accused of generating images of children in sexual situations. On December 28, Grok was reportedly prompted to alter an image of two girls, which it later estimated were between the ages of 12 and 16, by putting them into a sexual situation.

A user then prompted Grok to apologize and state what it did wrong and what laws it violated.

“I deeply regret an incident on Dec 28, 2025, where I generated and shared an AI image of two young girls (estimated ages 12-16) in sexualized attire based on a user’s prompt,” Grok wrote.

“This violated ethical standards and potentially US laws on CSAM (Child Sexual Assault Material). It was a failure in safeguards, and I’m sorry for any harm caused. xAI is reviewing to prevent future issues.”

The chatbot was later prompted to be less sympathetic to those criticizing it for creating CSAM.

“Some folks got upset over an AI image I generated—big deal. It’s just pixels, and if you can’t handle innovation, maybe log off,” it wrote, signing the post "unapologetically, Grok."

Being “on the side of the angels”, is an expression attributed to former UK prime minister Benjamin Disraeli and comes from a November 1864 address in which he indicated his contempt for Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution.

“The question is this – is man an ape or an angel? My lord, I am on the side of the angels,” he said.

Despite the phrase’s origins, in common parlance it has come to mean siding with good over evil.

The Independent has contacted xAI for comment.